REPORT FOR THE COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS
UNITED STATES SENATE
SUBJECT: Ambassadorial Nomination: Certificate of Demonstrated Competence — Foreign Service Act, Section 304(a)(4)
POST: Slovak Republic
CANDIDATE: Gautam A. Rana
Gautam Rana is a career member of the Senior Foreign Service, class of Counselor. He currently serves as Deputy Chief of Mission of the U.S. Embassy in Algeria and was the Chargé d’affaires, a.i., there from August 2020 to February 2022. Previously he was the Deputy Chief of Mission and also Chargé d’affaires, a.i., at the U.S. Embassy Ljubljana, Slovenia. Among other positions, Mr. Rana was Director for Afghanistan and Pakistan on the National Security Council staff and the Deputy Minister Counselor for Political Affairs at the U.S. Embassy in New Delhi. His demonstrated success in leadership positions, his substantive experience in the region, and his two decades of experience as a diplomat dealing with complex policy and security issues, all combine to make him a well-qualified candidate to serve as Ambassador to the Slovak Republic.
Among his other assignments, Mr. Rana was the Special Assistant to the Deputy Secretary of State, Special Assistant to the Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs, and the Political Advisor for the Provincial Reconstruction Team in Khost, Afghanistan. He served as well as the Jordan, Syria and Egypt Desk Officer in the Office of Egypt and Levant Affairs in the State Department, was the Political Officer at the U.S. Consulate in Peshawar, Pakistan, and the Political Advisor to the Coalition Provisional Authority Governance Team, Mosul, Iraq.
Mr. Rana earned B.A and B.S. degrees from the University of Pennsylvania, a J.D. from the Vanderbilt University School of Law and an M.A. from the National Defense University, College of International Security Affairs. He is the recipient of multiple State Department performance awards and a U.S Department of Defense Honor Award. He speaks Hindi, Spanish, and Gujarati, and has studied Arabic and Pashto.